Wednesday 11 July 2012 03.30 EDT
First published on Wednesday 11 July 2012 03.30 EDT

A director of the Mark Twain museum in the author's Connecticut home has written to Brent council and to ministers Ed Vaizey and Jeremy Hunt begging them to reconsider the closure of the library in Kensal Rise, west London, which Twain himself first opened more than 100 years ago.

"One of the assets of any city, any culture or any society is its repository of knowledge. Mark Twain, the man we honour here at his home in Hartford, Connecticut, USA, knew this when he said: 'A public library is the most enduring of memorials, the trustiest monument for the preservation of an event or a name or an affection; for it, and it only, is respected by wars and revolutions, and survives them,'" wrote Lamarre in a letter to Vaizey, the culture minister, and Hunt, culture secretary, and Brent council.

"In 1900, Mark Twain on a visit to Dollis Hill attended the opening and dedication of your historic Kensal Rise library. It is dismaying to hear of its closure, but the reason is not so surprising. Twain, in a way, anticipated it at its opening: 'If the community is anxious to have a reading-room it would put its hand in its pocket and bring out the penny tax. I think it a proof of the healthy, moral, financial, and mental condition of the community if it taxes itself for its mental food.'"

Lamarre pleaded with the politicians to reconsider the closure of the branch, as "what you are losing in a library cannot be replaced in a community. You are leaving a legacy, much as Twain left a legacy of five books when he helped dedicate Kensal Rise's library."

He told the Guardian this week that he had written "to dozens of people" and had yet to receive any response. He drew a parallel between Kensal Green's plight and the struggle for survival of the Mark Twain House and Museum itself, which was twice saved by community action and now enjoys "record visitation, a balanced budget and dozens of public programs that entertain and enlighten".

"Our neighborhood faces similar financial challenges to the Brent community with a large population of immigrants. The library provides essential, free services not found elsewhere. Our collective wisdom said we could not allow the branch to close," he said.

And he promised, on behalf of the Mark Twain House and Museum, to personally travel to Kensal Rise with another five books to donate at the rededication of this "irreplaceable institution", if it is reopened, concluding: "Looking at the Brent council website, I can see that you are all incredibly attractive. On top of that, you are incredibly diverse. I hope that in your diversity you can find unity of purpose to make sure that you nourish your community with, as Twain called it, 'mental food'."